Awhile ago, when I used to blog, I referred to some statements of Senator Barbara Boxer, in my brilliantly-named Kos She Said So, That’s Why. Specifically, I quoted Boxer’s vilification of the Republican Party wherein she states “they want 100 percent.”

I held that quote up to ridicule not because I think it’s untrue, but because Barbara Boxer: a) obviously considers the Democratic Party to be cut of superior cloth; and b) thinks that a party shouldn’t want 100 percent. It may be that notions such as the latter are frequently rattled off in the laundry list of principles held by the American left — a list that would be remiss to omit fairness, bipartisanship, inclusion, and diversity — but it’s in fact quite contrary to the spirit in which I (and, I believe, everyone else) elect officials to represent me in the government.

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The latest melodrama that politicians and bloggers alike are throwing themselves into is “Rovegate,” the stupid, inconsequential, and highly boring scandal wherein covert CIA agent Valerie Plame has her identity revealed to the media. It’s called Rovegate because, well, it’s a scandal, and because Bush advisor Karl Rove seems to have had some role in the affair. Karl Rove is, of course, a favorite object of liberal hatred, since he’s so close to Bush, and since he’s an apparent egghead genius who controls Bush like a sock puppet from behind the scenes.

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The Daily Kos excerpted an interview yesterday that highlights a few thrilling and insightful comments from Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). (Does the designation “D-CA” make your eyes want to bleed, or what?)

Do you think the cracks are beginning to show in the Republican Party?
Senator Boxer: The American people are beginning to see the Republicans’ willingness to trample over 200 years of history, to step on the minority, to push everybody out of the way because they want 100 percent. It’s rubbing the American people the wrong way. One-party rule is not good. The American people as a whole are really pretty moderate. They’re not, as a whole, conservative or liberal. The right wing is marching the Republican Party off a cliff.

Things are definitely not going well for this Administration because this lust for power has overtaken their common sense. Take the President’s Social Security plan. It is so obvious that the people don’t want to privatize this program that has worked so well and lifted 50 percent of seniors out of poverty. He has gone so far as to hint that the United States might default on its debts. This is the President of the United States. What a message! For sixty years they’ve been waiting for the moment when they could frighten people into thinking Social Security is going broke. When, by the way, it isn’t at all.

Is it just me, or is anyone else sick of the endless partisan hackery that emanates from “both sides of the aisle”? (Anyone else hate that phrase?) Truly, though, we clearly do need someone to show us the path to moderation. And I think it should be someone who accuses an entire party of being willing to trample on 200 years of history, says that party wants 100%, accuses the administration (which coincidentally belongs to the party competing with hers) of possessing power lust, states that it’s obvious that the country (split nearly 50/50 between Dems and Reps) is deeply in love with Social Security, and implies that Republicans, as a solid bloc transcending generations and massive shifts in the body politic, have plotted tirelessly in back rooms to instill panic in all Americans. Left unsaid is the fact that the Republicans were all the while chomping smoldering, blown-out looking cigars, chortling evilly, and gazing with satisfaction on their smokestacks belching black pollutants into a pristine sky once populated only by children’s kites.

And she does THAT in the space of the first two paragraphs! Read the whole thing — it’s worth it. It almost makes you wonder if Kos stumbled upon a pre-release copy of a new Onion story parodying Democrat politicos.

Another day, another politician toeing the party line. If you read what these people say each day, I think you’ll find it positively astounding just how often all of us Americans “start to realize” that “the bad party” is out to kill us in our sleep. We always seem on the cusp of a revolution, and — what do you know — our faithful messenger is on the right side of history. Boxer characteristically provides no support for anything, shows none of her coveted moderation or reason in her comments (Republicans are 100% to blame, they act as a single bloc in all ways, and without them we could all complete our evolution to beings of pure energy, confident in the soundness of our Social Security system).

That’s how politicians are, left and right, and quite frankly, it’s sickening and irritating to read the same stuff day after day. Irritating that they continue to go through the motions, irritating that they live for the isolated soundbite instead of trying to make coherent sense in the larger picture, let alone actually improve the country. Irritating because they treat us all like addled morons salivating before the TV as we await their latest vitriolic prognosis of life in America.

Sickening because some, such as the denizens of the Daily Kos, eagerly step up to fulfill that role, and feed the cycle once more.

Bill Clinton today remarked to a group of young liberals that Democrats have it tough because they’re held to a double standard when they try to express their views. He cited the reaction to his wife’s seemingly moderate comments about abortion made earlier this year as an example.

Hillary Clinton’s comments were made in January to the New York State Family Planning Providers. Specifically, she commented that abortion “in many ways represents a sad, even tragic choice to many, many women.”

“All of a sudden,” he continued, the media began asking, “‘Is she selling out? Is she abandoning her principles?’ But if John McCain, who’s pro-life, works with Hillary on global warming, he’s a man of principle moving to the middle.”

“It’s nuts,” the former president said.

In reality, though, what’s perplexing to Bill Clinton has a couple of simple explanations. The first is that the media — who Clinton seems to say are in on this unfair skewering of Democrats — are, by and large, liberal (and I’ll post elsewhen with support for this claim). Who screams “sellout” the loudest but for someone’s former fans? The media expects nothing good of the Republicans in the first place; but for a bastion of liberalism such as Hillary Clinton to move toward the center, the alarms must be sounded.

The second rationale is the key to why this accusation might be leveled by those outside the media cabal. On a given point of policy contention, it’s likely that, before the end, the Democrats will have not only decried the stupidity of the Republican plan, but will have subjugated that supposed stupidity to its even grosser immorality.

Thus, we all now know that racism is the core of the right’s opposition to affirmative action; that their cold-heartedness lies behind their reluctance to send yet more aid to Africa; that their dislike of Kyoto arises from their willingness to destroy the planet for a buck; that border control is purely to keep “those impure brown people” from making an honest living; that resistance to indoor smoking bans are evidence of an unholy pact with Big Tobacco at the expense of poor, ignorant smokers (and innocent third parties inhaling their foul by-products); and that in rebuking calls for national healthcare, the right has allowed its utter contempt for the lower classes to bubble to the surface yet again.

It should come as no surprise whatsoever, then, that onlookers ridicule Hillary for her move to the center on the abortion issue; the left has long proclaimed the pro-life crowd to be misogynistic throwbacks who maintain no respect for obvious women’s rights. So, to move to the middle on such an important issue, particularly for a woman, is to compromise one’s very morals.

On the other hand, notice that the intent of the left is ever and always beyond the faintest whisper of a doubt. Even in midst of their most profoundly stupid proclamations of “the way things ought to be,” they are said — even by the right — to have “noble, if misguided,” intentions. Thus, McCain’s move to the center would simply indicate that — according to popular sentiment — he has moved in the direction that we would ALL like to go, if only there were a practical way to accomplish it. Maybe he found a practical solution, maybe not, but either way his intentions are pure; and as Bob Geldoff would say, “Something must be done, even if it doesn’t work.”

And this is all just assuming that Clinton hasn’t withdrawn further into his cave of paranoia and defensiveness — his example doesn’t do anything to fortify his claim, so I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt.

So rather than a double standard against Democrats, I’d like to propose the existence of a much more critical one against those not on the left: that of intentions.